Roberto Mancini believes he deserves much of the credit for Manchester City's success because he helped to build the side that won the Premier League and the Capital One Cup last season.
Mancini was sacked as City manager in May 2013 after three-and-a-half years in charge at the Etihad Stadium, during which time he won three trophies.
The Italian signed some of Manuel Pellegrini's key players, including Yaya Toure, David Silva, Sergio Aguero, Samir Nasri and Edin Dzeko, and worked with others, such as Joe Hart, Vincent Kompany and Pablo Zabaleta.
"I think that we started to build this team five years ago," he said in FourFourTwo. "In two years we won the Premier League, the FA Cup -- we won everything in England.
"And this current team are playing nine of my players all of the time. I am very happy with that because I know these players. I think it's not easy to build a strong team with only four or five years."
City had not won a major honour for 35 years until Mancini's side triumphed in the FA Cup in 2011, while they had not won the league for 44 years until his team finished first in 2012.
And now the former Inter Milan manager, who never took City out of the Champions League group stages, thinks his old club could become one of the continent's leading forces.
He added: "They are a team like Bayern Munich, Real Madrid and Barcelona -- big teams that have been like that for 50 years. You need the time to improve, but we have a big chance also to be one of the best teams in Europe."